Religious leaders say Jindal tax data is wrong

Last Modified: Friday, March 22, 2013 3:29 PM

BATON ROUGE (AP) — Gov. Bobby Jindal's claims that nearly all families will get a financial break under his tax swap proposal
doesn't factor all the sales tax increases into the analysis, a group of religious leaders said Friday.

That omission "dramatically skews" the data and shows a lower sales tax burden for households than they would face, said clergy
with the United Faith Community of Louisiana, a 300-member organization critical of Jindal's tax code rewrite.

The Republican governor wants to get rid of state personal and business income taxes. In exchange, he proposes increasing
the state sales tax from 4 percent to 5.88 percent, raising tobacco taxes and charging the higher sales tax rate on a new
array of services that aren't currently taxed, like cable TV, haircuts, Internet service and visits to the zoo.

The clergy group said the Jindal administration analysis only looks at raising existing sales taxes to 5.88 percent, but doesn't
include the impact of charging the higher tax on the new categories.

Rev. Melvin Rushing, a Baptist pastor from Baton Rouge, said that means half the sales tax hike is left out of calculations
for how the swap would affect households.

"We call on Gov. Jindal to withdraw and
publicly disavow this analysis so that citizens and elected officials
can begin to
have a reasonable debate based on facts, not distortion and
untruths," Rushing said at the state Capitol, gathered with two
dozen religious leaders.

Figures contained on the Department of Revenue "tax burden analysis" that show all household income categories gaining income
under the governor's tax change don't seem to include the new services to be taxed as part of the review.

The revenue department hasn't answered questions about how the chart was developed.

Jindal's leader on the tax code rewrite, Tim Barfield, has said the proposal would shift more taxes to businesses to offset
the tax breaks being given to households while keeping the entire plan "revenue neutral." He also said the governor's plan
includes a rebate program for low-income residents to help them cover the costs of increased sales taxes.

Barfield said businesses would pay more mostly because of the new sales taxes on services, like janitorial, accounting and
technology services that companies use.

"More than 80 percent of the expanded sales tax base does not impact families and individuals," Barfield said in a statement
released Friday in response to the clergy criticism.

But his statement didn't answer questions about whether the remaining 20 percent of the money generated from new sales taxes
on services was factored into the department's analysis used to determine the effects on families.

Barfield has said the overall plan would
help businesses by giving them a more stable and less complex tax
structure to navigate,
because they can pick which goods and services they want,
therefore deciding how much in taxes they want to pay.

The United Faith Community of Louisiana disagrees with that assessment. The group says Jindal's tax plan would put a larger
burden for running government operations on the poor and middle class, which would pay a larger percentage of their income
in sales taxes than higher-income residents.